I think that the resolutions that we did last year were excellent in keeping a lot of the content focused here. That’s not to say that the frequency of content was not sometimes overwhelming. But, it does speak to the fact that there was a focus and a reason for why content exists here. I think we’ve covered well the implications of those resolutions. So, what’s left in mobile ministry to poke towards

A few resolutions for 2013:

1. Explain, emphasize, and demonstrate the theological underpinnings to mobile ministry
2. Detail and expand on knowledge of Non-English Language/Cultural expressions of mobile ministry
3. Increase number of and collaboration with ministry partners
4. Refine and release v2 of the Mobile Ministry Methodology
5. Embed Mobile, Not Mobile As Layer

There is a statement that’s accredited to the hockey great Wayne Gretzky, and in a lot of respects, points to how resolutions like these (and even your own) should be viewed:

I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been.

The puck is mobile, and there are several players making a decent game out of what’s going on. I don’t see the puck in the same way as others do, and at the same time, what I’ve seen is in part played by others for positive and negative reasons.

I’m looking at these resolutions in part as a means to be a part of that aspect of pushing things forward in mobile ministry. Certainly, some of what is said here is caught and becomes seed or ground for other’s efforts. At the same time, this magazine started off and continues with a perspective not of going where folks are, but pointing to where they will be. In 2004, we were already in hand with PDAs and smartphones, and by 2006 we were already doing the majority of the work on this site on a mobile device. Its been very long beyond current mobility that MMM has walked. The goal in these resolutions is for that to continue… even if that means an irrelevance to MMM compared to the voices and actions of others.

Stay tuned for a further explanation of these resolutions, and how we plan on following through with them – as well as the monthly look back on progress towards these.

Hard to believe that MMM has been going since Fall of 2004 and now its Winter of 2013. That’s a long time to be looking at this intersection of faith and mobile. And even still, its a long time to have readers such as yourselves sticking around. So, first off, we want to say Happy New Year and welcome to 2013. And from there, take the first of a few looks back at 2012.

Top Articles of the Past Year
We’ve had the normal, lengthy publishing queue in 2012. It was actually one of the most consistent years in terms of days that we’ve posted content. From the perspective of articles, there was on average just under 5 articles posted per week. That’s a lot of content. Some of those articles that continued to catch the attention of visitors old and new included:

• How to Build an App for Your Ministry (2011)
• Resolution #3: Get Connected to Tech, Mobile, and Mobile Ministry Events
• Mobile Ministry Methodology v1
• Some More Examples of Mobile Advertising and Marketing
• Tablet Word-Processing App Comparison
• A Primer on the Differences Between Mobile Web Apps and Native Apps
• Apps for Pastors (2011)
• Using the Kindle for Bible Study
• Interview with David Palusky of Renew Outreach
• Differences Between Smartphones and Feature Phones (2011)
• What Are the Bible Database Sources Developers Can Use

As you can see from the listing, there were a few posts from 2011 that made themselves into being very popular for 2012. That’s good on our part that we’ve got content that lives for a while (given the frequency of posting), but also speaks to some of the things within mobile/mobile ministry that don’t move as fast as other items.

Top Pages of 2012
Some of our content isn’t produced as articles, but sits (for now) on static pages. Here are the pages that have gotten the most views over the past year:

• Bible Apps
• Services (previously named, Web/Mobile Development and Services)
• Case Studies and Resources
• Issues, Presentations, and Experiments

Makes sense that these are the top pages (that aren’t the home page) here. We did some trimming of the names for these pages at one point in the year, and the traffic to them went up (and stayed up). For the Bible Apps page, we’ve added a few more categories, some of which go beyond Bible apps specifically, but make sense on that page. We’ve also started linking to some other content sources for various platforms as it made sense to do so. The Services page is a bit of a gem and a directory. Lots have been added there as well. The latter two pages see continual updates, so its no surprise that they get the kind of traffic and recall they do.

Traffic and Stats
Overall traffic has been strong. Compared to 2011, we’ve seen an increase of about 20% across those coming to the website (normal and mobile sites) and those who use RSS. There’s been more of a question of how to get MMM via email, but that bends to a few demographics more than others.

About 45% of MMM’s traffic comes from search engine searches. That’s a pretty high number, but given the type of content and how much it is, there’s only so much surprise there. The average visitor spends a tick under 2 minutes on the site (blame the length of articles), and we get a decent number of repeat visitors. Strangely enough, we’ve got more folks who’ve come to the site more than 8 times than those who’ve come between 4 and 8 times.

Upcoming
In a future article, we’ll talk about the resolutions for 2013 and how those will guide the content for 2013 here. There might be some other changes down the pipe as well. For many, 2013 is looking like a year of new beginnings… for MMM, we just continue on the pace of continually evolving within this space called mobile ministry. From that point in this intersection, we explore the new roads and map life accordingly.